Extra, extra: The Delphian is LI’s best collegiate read

Fit to print: The Delphian, Adelphi University's student-run newspaper, is tops among its regional peers, according to the Press Club of Long Island.

June 13, 2018

By GREGORY ZELLER //

Add some Adelphi University gold to the old gag about “black and white and read all over.”

The Delphian, official student newspaper of the Garden City-based university, has been named Long Island’s best college newspaper of 2018 by the Press Club of Long Island, out-paging a host of periodicals published by larger Island schools.

The PCLI dished out more than 200 first-, second- and third-place awards to professional and student journalists, spanning all media, at its June 7 awards dinner in Woodbury. It handed four of them to The Delphian, including a first-place award for Sports Reporting, third-place showings in the Best College News Reporter and Narrative Feature categories, and the top college-paper prize.

Adelphi University senior adjunct professor Liza Burby, The Delphian’s faculty advisor, also won a first-place column-writing award for her work on WorkingMother.com, a self-described “mentor, role model and advocate” for the nation’s 17 million-plus working moms.

Burby also captured a second-place Business Reporting award and a third-place Education Reporting award, both for Newsday, which paced the PCLI field with 96 total honors.

That’s a wrap: Chief editor and Class of 2018 graduate Gabrielle Deonath is handing over the reins of The Delphian.

Gabrielle Deonath, The Delphian’s outgoing editor-in-chief, credited Burby with much of the student newspaper’s success, noting the professor and professional journalist was “always available to provide assistance and guidance” and offered “such extensive experience in an industry that many of us hope to break into.”

“It helps tremendously to have an adviser who is so involved in the process,” Deonath said.

En route to PCLI’s college-newspaper title, The Delphian covered national issues ranging from school shootings and gun control to immigration and DACA, in addition to profiling campus artists and alumni and extensively covering Adelphi athletics and campus events.

While Burby’s influence was invaluable, the paper wouldn’t have shined – particularly against competition as strong as The Statesman, Stony Brook University’s student paper, and The Hofstra Chronicle – without the talent and dedication of its student staff, according to Deonath.

“We are competing against college newspapers that are twice or triple our size, or even larger,” the chief editor noted. “I really feel that this award is indicative of the talent, strength and dedication of our small staff.

“This was only possible because everyone, from writers and editors to the graphic designers, came to the table every issue with their best ideas and their best work.”

Deoanath, a member of Adelphi’s now-graduated Class of 2018, plans to continue writing for her own website, The Hijab Diaries (chronicling the life of an American-Muslim writer), and will become an assistant editor of Brown Girl Magazine.

She will hand the chief editor reins next fall to Nicoletta Cuccio, who captured that first-place Sports Writing award in this year’s PCLI competition.